Plot Bunnies, Plot Chickens, Etc.

threshie:

petermorwood:

killerblackberrypie:

gallagherwitt:

As a lot of people aren’t familiar with plot creatures, I thought I’d shed some light on the members of the mental menagerie…

The Plot Bunny – Story ideas that come bounding in and start multiplying.

The Plot Chicken – They squawk, flap around, and shit everywhere, but
when you actually need to do something with them, they scatter.

The Plot Sloth – Takes its sweet goddamned time turning into something useful.

The Plot Mule – When you mash two plots together and get something
cool, but you can’t get a sequel out of it to save your life.

The
Plot Cat – Lazy little bastards who take up your headspace, scare away
all the other plot bunnies, but won’t actually do anything except lay
there.

The Plottweiler – Barks loudly and viciously so you can’t
ignore it, distracts you from everything else you want to write, but
leaves you too paralyzed with fear to actually put words down.

The Plot Squirrel – Cute, distracting, full of nuts, and just TRY to keep up with that train of thought.

The Plot Bedbug – Shows up during the night, chews on you so you can’t sleep, and disappears in the daylight.

The Plot Tick – Burrows in, bleeds you dry, and leaves you with the creepy-crawlies. Mostly preys on horror writers.

The Plotroach – Totally unappealing, but so tenacious they’ll survive anything until you finally give up and write them.

What Plot Creatures have you encountered?

@petermorwood

The Plot Shark – While you’re paddling happily along it surges out of nowhere and takes a big bite out of what you’re working on.

The Plotranha – Like the Plot Shark, but lots of smaller and more nibbly bites, often until there’s nothing left but a skeleton.

The Plotegrine Falcon – One of those ideas that looks great but, unless you’re very quick, will be gone before you know it’s there.

The Plot House-Mouse – related to the Plot Bedbug, it’s the idea that goes “skrit-skrit” late at night and keeps you from sleeping, partly because you know you can’t do anything about it until morning – by which time it’s gone all quiet. Attempts to trap it leaves a remnant that’s a lot less annoying but also a lot less attractive, and is usually just thrown away.

The Plot Swan (a) – That beautifully phrased sentence or paragraph where everything is just right and seems effortless, and only you know how much energy you’ve expended to get it that way.

The Plot Swan (b) –
That beautifully phrased sentence or paragraph where everything is just right

until you realise you’ve been so busy with form that you forgot function, and there’s a continuity error in the middle that chases you for ages afterwards. (Plot Swan (b) often turns up after publication when it’s too late to fix.)

I, too, have a Plot Menagerie. These all sound so familiar!

I will never not reblog this!!!